(MAC/MAI) Mycobacterium Avium Complex Pulmonary Disease: Join us

Posted by Katherine, Alumni Mentor @katemn, Nov 21, 2011

I am new to Mayo online .. I was hoping to find others with .. MYCOBACTERIUM AVIUM COMPLEX PULMONARY DISEASE (MAC/MAI) and/or BRONCHIECTASIS. I found only 1 thread on mycobacterium accidently under the catagory "Lungs". I'm hoping by starting a subject matter directly related to MYCOBACTERIUM AVIUM COMPLEX PULMONARY DISEASE (MAC/MAI) I may find others out there!

I was diagnosed by a sputum culture August 2007 (but the culture result was accidentally misfiled until 2008!) with MYCOBACTERIUM AVIUM COMPLEX PULMONARY DISEASE (MAC/MAI) and BRONCHIECTASIS. I am now on 5 antibiotics. Working with Dr. Timothy Aksamit at Rochester Mayo Clinic .. he is a saint to have put up with me this long! I was terrified of the treatment . started the first antibiotic September 3, 2011 ... am now on all 5 antibiotics for 18 mos to 2 years. Am delighted at the very bearable side effects!

I wrote on the 1 thread I found: If you google NON-TUBERCULOUS MYCOBACTERIUM AVIUM COMPLEX PULMONARY DISEASE (MAC/MAI) you will learn a LOT about the disease. But PLEASE do NOT get scared about all the things you read .. that is what I did and nearly refused to do the treatment until after a 2nd Micomacterium was discovered! Educate yourself for "due diligence" .. but take it all with a grain of salt .. you are NOT necessarily going to have all the terrible side effects of the antibiotics! Good luck to you!

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January 2017 Update

One of our great Connect Members .. @Paula_MAC2007  .. had a wonderfully helpful idea that I wanted to share! Her idea .. as you read through the pages to gather information on our shared disease of MAC you can develop a personal "file cabinet" for future reference without the necessity of reading all the pages again!

If you have the "MS Word" program on your computer:
- Document Title Example:  Mayo Clinic Connect MAI/MAC Information
- Then develop different categories that make sense to you such as:  Heath Aids .. Videos .. Healthy Living .. Positive Thinking .. Baseline Testing and Regular Testing .. Antibiotics ..
Tips for
- As you read the pages .. copy/paste/save things of interest into that MS Word document under your preferred categories for future reference.

Then as you want to refer back to something in the future .. YEAH!  You have now created your own personal "file cabinet" on MAC/MAI!  Go to it!

Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the MAC & Bronchiectasis Support Group.

@windwalker

Got great news today! Got my sputem test results back today; NO significant presence of any mycobacterium or fungal things growing.

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Terri, I thought there was no treatment for bronchiectasis.

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@alleycatkate

@windwalker...Hi Terri...My recent research has turned up a very interesting article showing plants in use in other countries that appear to be effective against MAC and TB. You need to click on the PDF to view the entire article: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1076/phbi.35.2.77.13284 . It is somewhat extensive but if you look at the chart midway you can see the herbs that work on MAC. The one that I am most interested in and I have ordered is Oplopanax horridus (Devil's Club) . There are many corroborating articles written...https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9392889 and http://kylenorton.healthblogs.org/2011/11/27/the-world-most-popular-herbs-devils-club-oplopanax-horridus-health-benefits-and-side-effects/
Anyway...I am very excited...It is a readily available plant tincture and very reasonable. I put this info out there as an alternative to those that cannot tolerate the antibiotics or for people, like myself, that refuse them. I will keep you posted. Oh...Just did hear from Mayo today that they will NOT work with my insurance so I need to wait till January and switch insurance. Hope you are doing well and feeling good. Thanks for all your hard work. xxoo Kathy

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@colleenyoung ...best i can come up with...

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1076/phbi.35.2.77.13284
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9392889

and the following excerpt: from this article ( http://cms.herbalgram.org/herbalgram/issue62/article2697.html?ts=1533176966&signature=956770716fa69ff2ad1da3406ba5b62e )

The earliest, and some of the only, published descriptive phytochemical work that has been conducted on the North American devil’s club is by Kariyone and Morotomi,47 who described a sesquiterpene (equinopanacene) and a sesquiterpene alcohol (equinopanacol) in O. horridus. In more recent phytochemical investigations on O. horridus, Bloxton et al.48 reported a number of sterols and four sesquiterpenes, one of which (spatulenol) is novel to the genus. Kobaisy et al.11 described two novel and three previously described polyenes, one of which (oplopandiol) has recently been synthesized.18 These acetylenes all display significant antimycobacterial and antifungal activity49 and most are active against common bacteria such as Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli, and Candida albicans. These compounds are also active against Mycobacterium tuberculosis and Mycobacterium avium, both of which can cause significant clinical tuberculosis, particularly virulent in immuno-compromised hosts, AIDS patients being especially vulnerable. Notably, these pathogens are also responsible for the epidemic status of tuberculosis in Canada’s indigenous population.50 Since many strains of M. tuberculosis and M. avium are also resistant to the most commonly used antimycobacterial drugs, there is considerable interest in the potential of devil’s club in tuberculosis therapy. Extracts of devil’s club inner bark also partially inhibit a respiratory syncytial virus.9

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@windwalker

Got great news today! Got my sputem test results back today; NO significant presence of any mycobacterium or fungal things growing.

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That's so great, Terri! What a great feeling that must have been when you got that news! Nan

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@windwalker

Got great news today! Got my sputem test results back today; NO significant presence of any mycobacterium or fungal things growing.

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It was great news. Thanks!

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@ling123

@windwalker Terri, I have the same attitude toward MAC. I don't think about it. Life is short, thinking about it will not stop it from happening and will only take up the energy that we can use to enjoy life, family, friends and this beautiful world. I'm living a active life and have not had any indication that MAC is back. I believe I'm keeping it at bay and will try my best to do that for as long as I can.

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@ling123, I love it! Attitude is everything.

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@windwalker

Got great news today! Got my sputem test results back today; NO significant presence of any mycobacterium or fungal things growing.

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I finally got my my chloride saline! We had such a long wait! But I’m excited to start using it. And I’m looking forward to feeling great! Thanks all for the wonderful group with so many good advice. Rita

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@gardenernj

@heathert Can you tell me what the the wholefood diet entails?

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@gardenernj, a wholefood diet is unprocessed food. The meats are cuts of meat, not processed into hotdogs, coldcuts, etc. Fish. Vegetables and fruits are fresh or flash frozen. Avoid foods that come in a box more or less. I avoid gluten because it causes inflammation in my body and has since I was a kid. Wholefoods are basicly food left in their natural form without additives.

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@windwalker

Got great news today! Got my sputem test results back today; NO significant presence of any mycobacterium or fungal things growing.

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@america Yay!!! So glad you have your saline. It might feel harsh at first and make you cough. Remember coughing is good because it brings up the gunk. If you find it too irritatiing at first, do as much as you can and build up doing the full vial all at once. Most people do alright with it though. You become used to it eventually and it doesn't feel harsh (burn). Let me know if you see improvement by using it.

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@alleycatkate

@windwalker...Hi Terri...My recent research has turned up a very interesting article showing plants in use in other countries that appear to be effective against MAC and TB. You need to click on the PDF to view the entire article: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1076/phbi.35.2.77.13284 . It is somewhat extensive but if you look at the chart midway you can see the herbs that work on MAC. The one that I am most interested in and I have ordered is Oplopanax horridus (Devil's Club) . There are many corroborating articles written...https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9392889 and http://kylenorton.healthblogs.org/2011/11/27/the-world-most-popular-herbs-devils-club-oplopanax-horridus-health-benefits-and-side-effects/
Anyway...I am very excited...It is a readily available plant tincture and very reasonable. I put this info out there as an alternative to those that cannot tolerate the antibiotics or for people, like myself, that refuse them. I will keep you posted. Oh...Just did hear from Mayo today that they will NOT work with my insurance so I need to wait till January and switch insurance. Hope you are doing well and feeling good. Thanks for all your hard work. xxoo Kathy

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@alleycatkate Thank you for posting this. It was an interesting read. I like that NIH recognizes it's benefits as well.

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@windwalker

Got great news today! Got my sputem test results back today; NO significant presence of any mycobacterium or fungal things growing.

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Thanks Terri! I will let you know! I’m going to try it today. Most of the pharmacies don’t carry it here in Tampa.. I’m not sure why but I am so blessed to finally get it.

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